Del Friscos Grille

A lot of my fellow foodie friends have blogged about the new Del Frisco’s Grille. Unfortunately for me, most of them were invited to their pre-opening day press dinner . I’m pretty pissed that I wasn’t invited because not only do I like to eat for free but my witty sense of humor is always a real treat.
Although I was full of rage, the pictures I saw of their food couldn’t keep me away for very long. In fact, the food looked so delicious that I only invited people who would eat a lot to join me when I went so we could eat until we puked.
Del Frisco’s Grille was packed out when we arrived – something I like to see at any new Dallas restaurant. I really do want to see everyone in the restaurant business succeed…ok, that’s a lie. If you fucking blow and I hate you, I don’t want you to succeed because you are wasting space of a potentially amazing other restaurant. Like I was saying, Del Frisco’s Grille was packed and even though we had reservations we still had to wait for at least 20 minutes to be seated. I can’t particularly say I appreciated that but what I did appreciate was the fact that the bar is 3 steps from the hostess stand and there was a Kilt Lifter cocktail waiting to be drunk by me.Once we finally sat down, I was STARVING, not that that is anything new for me. We immediately asked our server which appetizers he would suggest and without hesitation he said the Jumbo Lump Crabcake and Asian Chicken Dumplings. Dumplings? No thanks, this isn’t Panda Express. Crabcakes? Twist my arm!
Now, if there is one thing I hate it is when a restaurant serves a crab cake. How awkward. I don’t care if it is so delicious that it cures cancer, when you put one crab cake on a plate (and charge $16 for it) that immediately turns me off. The only time serving one crab cake is permissible is when it is in between two pieces of bread and disguised as being a sandwich. Anyway, the jumbo lump crabcake was fine – not exactly something that I would suggest as being a must try if I was a waiter but that could be why I don’t work there. There was quite a bit of crab meat and hardly any breading which was nice, but it is a cake after all – a little bit of breading would be nice. The cajun lobster sauce tasted nothing like lobster or…cajun. Strike 1.
Giving a mental “go fuck yourself” to the waiter I decided it was time to take matters into my own hands. I went ahead and ordered the Ahi Tacos, Deviled Eggs, Cheesesteak Eggrolls, Pimento Cheese Fritters, Pulled Roasted Chicken Flatbread and a Roasted Tomato Flatbread. WHAT? There were 10 4 people at our table after all!
The Ahi Tacos were everything I’ve dreamed of and more. Fresh ahi that was wonderfully…raw. The plump and juicy meat was mixed with avocado and topped with spicy citrus mayo. To make the situation even better, all off these goodies came in a delicious fried wonton shell – as if anything could suck when it comes in a fried shell. To add to my obsession, the ahi tacos came in a mini taco holder. Strike 1 was dismissed.I was a little confused when the deviled eggs arrived at our table. I could have sworn that we ordered the regular deviled eggs, not the ones that looked like they had green diarrhea on top. Although the presentation was horrifying, the deviled eggs themselves were delicious. The filling was extremely smooth and overflowing out of the egg white. Atop the egg was a truffle-chive vinaigrette which didn’t have much taste at all – disappointing since I love me some truffles. All in all I did enjoy the deviled eggs but would hesitate in ordering them again just because of the way they are presented- Barftastic!
Next, it was time to criticize sample the Cheesesteak Eggrolls. Like I said earlier, it is really hard for something to be shitty when it comes in a fried shell and these were no exception! I don’t really have much to say about these because I’m 99% positive this was the point I started to fall into a food coma. What I can say is it tastes like a cheesesteak sandwich, rolled in a tube and fried and therefore there I can’t even come up with the slightest bit of negative feedback.
Not to be deterred by my food coma, I pressed on.
The pimento cheese fritters were my next victim. These were disgusting. This just may be the first time in my entire life that I actually hated something that was fried. All this time I thought that you could fry up a ball of poop and I’d like it but nay, Del Frisco’s Grille found something worse and its called a pimento cheese fritter. Isn’t a fritter supposed to be flat? These were balls. Pimento cheese explode-in-your-mouth balls. The fried part was great (duh), it was the slurpy surprise inside that was repulsive. And the sauce? Chipotle Ranch my ass. Ugh, I can’t go on – I’m starting to dry heave.
Last but not least it was flat-bread time. We ordered the Pulled Roasted Chicken first and it was so fantastically delicious that we ordered the Roasted Tomato- you know, something “light.” Not too big and not too small, the flatbreads are perfect for sharing or can be a meal of their own. I wasn’t particularly impressed with the Roasted Tomato as it tasted like a sub-par margherita pizza you can get from any Italian-esque restaurant. On the other hand, the pulled roasted chicken was absolutely insane – in a good way. Thinly sliced red skinned potatoes and pulled chicken rest upon a deliciously light layer of goat cheese. I really appreciate the crust of Del Frisco Grille’s flatbreads – too often flatbreads arrive too thin and the crust practically falls apart. Not here! They have found the perfect combination of thin crust and serious pizza!
Unfortunately, I either seemed to love or hate the items we tried. Oh well, different strokes for different folks right? Fuck that. This is MY blog so what I say sucks – sucks! Out of the laundry list of items that we sampled during our visit to Del Frisco’s Grille I would come back again and again for the ahi tacos and the roasted chicken flat bread. These two items in particular are absolutely fantastic.
Oh, and for the people of Del Frisco’s Grille, I’m sure everything tasted delicious on press night…you know, the one I wasn’t invited to? Please note.